1. Technical Field
This document relates to methods and materials involved in detecting nucleic acid. For example, this document relates to methods and materials involved in using an enzymatic amplification cascade of restriction endonucleases to detect nucleic acid.
2. Background
The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is a technique commonly used to amplify and detect nucleic acid. For example, real-time PCR can be used to amplify and detect small amounts of template DNA present in a sample. Typically, PCR involves adding a nucleic acid primer pair and a heat-stable DNA polymerase, such as Taq polymerase, to a sample believed to contain a targeted nucleic acid to be amplified. Subjecting the sample containing the primer pair and polymerase to a thermal cycling process sets in motion a chain reaction in which the targeted DNA template located between the primers is exponentially amplified. The presence of this amplified template can be detected using techniques such as gel electrophoresis or the amount of amplified template can be assessed using techniques such as those involving the use of fluorescently labeled probes.